"Bearly" hanging on this Palm Sunday

 Another Sunday without going to church. "Without going to a church building," Brad stressed, "Remember...WE are the Church." I sighed. I knew he was right. But it was Palm Sunday. I wanted to be at church...singing, praying, smiling, celebrating, and worshiping with my friends. I wanted to be yelling "Hosanna in the highest!" while little kids passed out the slender palms, inadvertently tickling chins and noses with the fragile ferns in the process. But Covid-19 had destroyed any hope of that. Brad filled up my travel coffee cup, wrestled me into my coat, and hustled me out the door. "Didn't you JUST read me something about that?" he asked, leading me to the van. "About how the church wasn't destroyed...it was deployed?" I nodded, sniffling.

I stared out the van window as the world whipped by. I sipped my coffee and sulked. It's not like we could actually go anywhere. "Look!" Brad pointed as a flash of red streaked across the road. "Was that a fox?" I squealed and then shrieked as another one was fast on his friend's tail. Now my eyes were peeled. We saw a pair of swans in a small pond. And then, around a bend... "turkey...turkey...turkey" I chanted as a big ol' tom took his time crossing the two lanes. I laughed at a

white fuzzy llama stomping and skipping around his lady who was none too happy with the attention he was attempting to bestow upon her. Spring was definitely in the air. "Look at that," Brad said as he slowed the van next to a farm. A newborn calf...a NEW newborn calf stood on wobbly legs, regarding us warily as its mom moo-ed a soft assurance. I felt my throat tighten at this sign...of continued life. Birth. Hope.

Armed with our coffee and some doughnuts, Brad and I parked by the river to enjoy the rushing water. We walked down under the bridge, delighting in the echo of our words. Soon we were skipping stones. I'd skipped stones AS a kid and WITH my kids but couldn't remember a time I'd skipped stones as an adult for just the pure enjoyment of passing a smooth pebble over the surface. Two hops. Three. Four. I cast my cares upon the water.

We decided to deliver some lilies to my parents' porch before taking the dogs for a walk at a nearby park. Passing through several small towns, I noticed bears peeking from the windows of many houses. I explained to Brad that this was based on a Facebook movement encouraging people to help engage kids as they took walks. Brad and I were soon racing to rack up the biggest bear-spotting record. Soon, the total number exceeded thirty. "We should put up a bear," I declared. "Do we even have a stuffed bear at home?" my husband asked hopefully ("Yeah...I was hoping we DIDN'T have one," Brad later confessed.). Our girls have been grown and gone for some time now. "I think we may have Sydney's Build-a-Bear with her pre-recorded voice," I said. "Then I guess we'll see," Brad answered.

Even bogged down in mud, our walk at the park was lovely. People have been making the pilgrimage to our beautiful state park so we'd diverted to a county one. We came upon a wooden walkway set like a pirate's punishment plank over a swamp that was teeming with life. Frogs played bass to the lilting sound of little birds with big voices. An old bumpy stump of a tree jutted out of the water on one side of us while in the opposite directions, a Louisiana bayou became part of our Western New York scenery. "If we were to take a selfie," I debated, "I'm not sure which background I'd choose." Clueless whenever I'm more-than-obviously hinting about something, Brad agreed, "That is a tough choice," before he began to walk off. Thanks to this self-isolating, Brad and I have been BLESSED to be able to spend SO much time together. Where once I would have gotten frustrated and been mad at him all day over something he hadn't even realized he'd done, I paused and then smiled. "I'm sorry," I told him, catching his arm, "I shouldn't expect you to be able to read my mind. Can we take a selfie?" Problem averted. Picture taken. Memory preserved. Lesson learned.

As soon as we arrived back home, I rushed into the girls' bedroom and happily exclaimed, "There it is!" I grabbed the brown bear, still looking quite becoming in its pink poodle skirt, from the shelf, dusting it off as I held it up for Brad to see. "Used to be, if you pinched its paw..." Suddenly Sydney's scratchy 10-year-old voice whispered across the room. Brad watched helplessly as the dam of emotions that he'd been valiantly trying to keep in check all day burst open as tears flooded down my face. He regarded the small stuffed bear that housed the ghostly voice of his little girl...the voice was here...an echo of the woman who was 3,000 miles away...separated from us, not just by distance but by circumstance.

So it was, that the Mosimans...on a Palm Sunday leading into Holy Week...featuring Good Friday...hung a bear up...to represent hope...for others to see. We are The Church.